The 72nd Hunger Games
by XenaXIV
Summary: The Hunger Games are sometimes bloody and ruthless. Other times the entire Games builds up to one showdown between a small number of tributes, with one tribute claiming victory alone. But the Hunger Games has another purpose: Entertainment. Who will win the 72nd Hunger Games?


CHAPTER ONE

Jonah Camiel

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There's an old wives' tale that says that hanging a horseshoe over a doorway is good luck. My father believes this and follows it to the letter. There isn't a room in our house that isn't adorned with an old horseshoe from the ranches. Sure, the house is small for five people, but it's cozy, and we make do.

My father wakes me up at the crack of dawn, even though there's no school today. It's reaping day. Not even the teachers want to be in school today.

My brothers, Joseph and Ben, are allowed to sleep in, because they don't have to be ready. They're 19, which makes them ineligible for the Reaping. Lucky jerks. Sarah, my sister, is already awake and embroidering something in the living room. I only have to get through two more Reapings after today.

My sister is talking quietly with my father, and I smell breakfast. The rust bucket of a TV in the living room is playing pre-reaping coverage, but no one in the District will be watching. District 10 isn't the best place in Panem, but it beats Districts 11 and 12. I'd rather be out riding horses than be choked up in a mine all day.

"Morning." I say, walking into the kitchen. "Mornin', Jonah." My father's mustache bristles when he talks, and Sarah pours some oatmeal into a bowl and puts a piece of banana on it to top it off. "Happy Hunger Games!" My sister imitates the silly Capitol accent, grinning, and hands me the bowl with one hand. "Please don't remind me." I roll my eyes. I'm not that worried about being picked. My name is only in there five times. There are seven hundred some-odd kids in our district, many poorer than we are. I'm doubtful my name will be drawn. I start to shovel breakfast in my mouth, remembering how hungry I am. My father looks across the table at me, his huge hand wrapped around a mug of thin black tea. He has stern, sea-green eyes like mine. However, he constantly tells me I look more like my mother.

My mother died when I was four or five, so I don't remember her all that much. I was named after her father, long dead now. My grandmother is still alive, though, and she regales me with stories about how my grandfather would sing, loudly and off-key, and my mother would always try to correct him. He died a few months before Mom did. Before she died, my father would sing old songs around the house, picking us up and spinning us around, but since she died, he rarely even smiles.

Joseph and Ben rip through the kitchen like a tornado, and before my sister can hand them their banana oatmeal they're outside, Joseph running after Ben in some wild chase for a shoe or something. I finish my oatmeal and fish the banana slice out of the bowl, eating it whole. "Delicious, Sarah." I say, and walk back up the stairs to change.

I laid out a nice pair of jeans and a not too rumpled button-up shirt for today. I wrestle the jeans on and button up the shirt, working a belt through the jeans and tightening it around my wiry frame. I head back downstairs, and Dad and Sarah are prepping to leave, while Joseph and Ben are sitting on the front steps. My boots are waiting, and I tug them on.

My father opens the door to me, and we step out into the stream of people heading for the town center. People seem uneasy, as the often do on Reaping Day.

The town center is usually a place of gathering and celebrations of holidays. However, today, it looks alien. The Hall of Justice looms over us, and banners plastered with the Capitol seal hang around us. It occurs to me, for the first time, that someone I know may be drawn for the reaping. As I check in, this agitates me, and as I'm escorted into the roped-off section for 16-year old boys I find myself picking at my nails.

Our escort, Adam Turquoise, with his swept blue hair, greets the crowd, and reads the long, boring history of Panem, and then reads the list of victors. In 71 years of Hunger Games, District 10 has had five victors, placing us in 7th among the rest of the districts. Two are still alive. One is an ancient old man named Noah Underwood, the other, who won just a few years ago, is named Natalia Drisco. The year Natalia won was the year I tasted sugar for the first time, but it's too sweet. I don't like it.

Adam walks over to the bowl on his left. "Ladies first." He says, with a devilish grin, fishing around in the bowl for a single slip of paper. He plucks one from the container, squints as he reads the name, and then announces it to the square. "Stella Illingworth." I breathe a sigh of relief. Nobody I know. Stella is extremely pale as she walks up to the stage, staring out at the crowd with wide, shocked eyes. However, as she walks up the stairs she regains a sense of composure, and keeps her face blank as Adam raises her hand for the crowd to unenthusiastic applause.

Adam then strides to the second bowl, peering in at the thousands of slips. "Now the gentlemen." He says, quickly plucking a single paper from the bowl and heading to the microphone. I'm zoned out by the time he speaks the name, and I blink a few times before I hear the actual name.

"Jonah Camiel."

That's me.

* * *

Writing a Hunger Games story BECAUSE I CAN! THIS IS AMERICA, PEOPLE!

Review and tell me what you think. If you liked it, I wrote it, and if you didn't like it... well, I still wrote it.

Happy Hunger Games!


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